The Gyalwang Drukpa

I forgot to mention something about Ladakh which is also very encouraging as part of the Live to Love campaign. With the help of Tessa Heron and her group, my nuns at Druk Pemei Den (or Druk Lotus Seat) have come down to the Naro Phodrang (Palace of Naropa, just next to the Druk White Lotus School) in Shey from their retreat place to work day and nights for planting trees and taking care of them as if they are taking care of their hundreds of new-born babies. This time, I could see hundreds of different types of trees are growing very nicely on the barren land. This place for thousands of years has never been used for any civilisations. It is like a moon land or a desert, without water, just sand and dust. In just about 6 months, what we can see now is amazing even for me. My heartfelt thanks go to the nuns who are working so hard to plant the trees and also to the Ladakh Hill Development Council in Leh who has helped to get water pump for irrigation, without their help, we would have no means to get the water to Shey.

I have high hope and I am enthusiastic to accomplished many tree planting projects in places like Ladakh and Nepal where there is acute shortage of trees and this will eventually and definitely cause many problems in our world, such as landslides, deterioration in air quality, shortage and drying up of water sources, and many others. Oh, speaking about this subject, at my request, my nuns on Druk Amitabha Mountain also planted dozens of trees here and everything seems to be coming up quite nicely. We definitely want to continue with this effort. Even though tree planting is a long-term process to help many beings, I think it's worth it. We shouldn't be waiting for disasters to happen to help and to change our lifestyle, we should be doing preventive things to reduce the sufferings of beings.

I want again to mention that I was very happy to see the progress of tree planting done by Drukpa Butterworth members. They even have a progress report, which is very professional and very clear. Please give them your encouragement so that they will continue to plant more trees to improve the lives of many beings.